E-levy: Minority’s walkout was a tactical game to block approval – Rickets-Hagan

Member of Parliament for Cape Coast South, Kweku George Ricketts-Hagan, has said the decision by the Minority in Parliament to stage a walkout during the approval of the e-levy was a move to stop the policy from being endorsed by the House.

Speaking on the Key Points on TV3 Saturday, April 2 with host Dzifa Bampoh, he said “My personal view is that we should have stayed and voted but leadership got the information we didn’t have and that information showed that the best option was to walk out and use the Supreme Court ruling. We deployed all strategies and at the eleventh hour, the strategy was to walk out before the Speaker put the question.

He added that the general consensus is that people didn’t want the e-levy.

“We wanted to see it through voting, it became a tactical game and we were looking at the numbers, so we were sort of monitoring each other, who is not in and who is being carried in an ambulance and the [Majority] were also doing that, to look at how they can get one of us to get out. The very day the voting was to take place was the day they invited one of our MPs to court. They checked our numbers and we checked theirs and so it was a tactical game."

“We asked what was best. If at this stage you realize that they have the numbers, what is the best way out? if we walk out and use the ruling of the court, will it help? The decision by our leadership was that our best option was to walk out.”

The minority walked out just before the approval of the policy and subsequently sued the Attorney General over the development.

The Minority Leader Haruna Iddrisu described the approval as illegal and unconstitutional because in their view, the Majority did not have the right numbers to pass it.

“This is a charade,” he said at a press conference in Parliament, adding that “there is no E-levy.”

“The majority of less than 137 conducting businesses only proceeded on illegal and unconstitutional business. Parliament did not have the numbers to take any decision that should be binding Parliament and Ghanaians,” he added.